While researching for the film I discovered that Genndy Tartakovsky and his team had hundreds of sketches for different characters in the films. Lots of these were drawn onto cereal boxes as you can see below because the texture and colour fit the aesthetic they were going for.
It’s interesting to see the vast difference in how the character sketches are from each other! I love the creativity and excitement portrayed in the sketches, adding playful views and even more serious ones.
The thought process for Dracula alone was a lot, getting his face shape right and getting his proportions right look to be what they sought the most.
I love the huge difference in mavis’ character designs as she goes from white hair and a thick wardrobe to her famous black bob and light attire. It’s inspiring to see the work put into these characters and the thought process displayed through each sketch.
Side characters like Frankenstein and Wayne were given as much thought as mavis and Dracula, conveying the importance of well-thought-out characters. Each character displays a different body shape which I love! Dracula is cone-shaped, Frankenstein is a big block, Wayne is a curve and Mavis is slightly curvy.
This allows for the character’s individualities to shine through and allow the audience to view them all as complete;y separate monsters, which was the plan.
I think my favorite part about Genndy Tartakovsky’s work in this film is Griffen’s character. There is no body, no face, no hair and yet the expressions are captured perfectly through a prop, a pair of glasses!
It makes me think about the armatures and how many the glasses have, it really is a lot to think about when you put it into perspective and they definitely do not come off as a ‘way out’. Animating a pair of glasses instead of a human is a hard job, portraying emotions and movement requires extra thought and work to perfect.
Researching this film has really made me appreciate the work that goes into all aspects of 3D, I would have loved to delve deep into this project without any initial sketches and start fresh in blender but this showed me how important it is to have a plan before modeling anything!